Angel's Share

[joea132]

After a discussion with my partner about barrel aging a question came up about the angel's share. While I know you concentrate flavors through evaporation, do you lose alcohol content? My partner is a very knowledgeable scotch aficionado and says scotch looses up to 2 percent in a year of it's alcohol. I have never read anything specific about alcohol loss but more overall volume loss.

Any ideas?

 

[ibglowin]

IIRC, you do if the relative humidity is above a certain amount. (I forget the exact %) but its high humidity which didn't make sense to me really but thats what they say. I live in the desert so not a problem for me!

 

[ffemt128]

I don't know about angel's share in a barrel, but I know the 2 liter barrel I bought to age some Wigle White Whiskey had help from more than angels. I went to try some after about 2 1/2 months in the barrel and I could barely muster a shot. Oh well, time to purchase some more.

 

[Wade E]

I can say yes. I had some whiskey in a vessel that wasnt air tight and after 2 years it was like colored water! I know being in a semi.sealed vessel (barrel) it should be much less but I was shocked when I went to take a sip. I had forgotten about this stuff and thought the vessel had a better seal then it did and was sorry I did this as this whiskey was sort of special and it was a total loss!

 

[joea132]

So do you think wine loses alcohol as a rule or only over a certain humidity point?

 

[ibglowin]

Above ~70% RH it will LOSE Ethanol

Below ~70% RH it will LOSE Water

 

[joea132]

Above ~70% RH it will LOSE Ethanol

Below ~70% RH it will LOSE Water

Thanks Mike, you're always a great resource!